cajuncody 10 Posted November 7, 2004 Share Posted November 7, 2004 Curious, If we are still in need of boys and there are a couple of schools in our area but in a different County could we recruit them or would they be in a different district. Or would it really matter where they live, just where they sign up at? As far as I know my pack has always recruited at our school. There are 2 schools just over the County line (we are close to it ourselves) that don't have any scout programs there. Would we be stepping over a line in the sand to recruit them or would it be a more serious issue? Kristi Link to post Share on other sites
dsteele 20 Posted November 7, 2004 Share Posted November 7, 2004 Kristi: When it comes to recruiting, I believe in do it where you can! Carpe Deim (seize the day!) Unc. Link to post Share on other sites
eisely 13 Posted November 7, 2004 Share Posted November 7, 2004 Go for it. You are to be applauded for trying to bring scouting into areas where it is not offered. Link to post Share on other sites
johndaigler 10 Posted November 8, 2004 Share Posted November 8, 2004 Besides, it's quite possible that any district/Council lines don't run along county lines anyway. GOOD LUCK!! jd Link to post Share on other sites
OldGreyEagle 5 Posted November 8, 2004 Share Posted November 8, 2004 Do it, like we always say in the Crew, (well almost always) Its easier to beg for forgiveness than ask for permisison Link to post Share on other sites
Bob White 20 Posted November 8, 2004 Share Posted November 8, 2004 You have mentioned "area" and "county" but you have not mentioned the important lines. District and council boundaries. Is the school within your district? Is it within your council? Link to post Share on other sites
cajuncody 10 Posted November 8, 2004 Author Share Posted November 8, 2004 Good question BobW. I don't have the answer to that yet. I have a call in to find out though. You would think that somewhere on Council website there would be a district map. But, alas, there isn't. Kristi Link to post Share on other sites
NJCubScouter 1389 Posted November 8, 2004 Share Posted November 8, 2004 Cajuncody, there may not be a map but there may be a council newsletter or something like that online. My council's newsletter always has a page for each district, and each of those pages has a box that says "(Whatever) District, serving the communities of..." Your council's web site may or may not have something similar. As has already been suggested in this thread, district boundaries often do not follow county lines. Up until a year or so ago, almost all of my county was in one district (the exception being one town that is in another council), and there were a few towns in other counties in the same district. Then they split the district up and added the pieces to other districts with towns from other counties. Even if the schools in question are in another district, I am not sure there is any rule against recruiting boys who live in another district. Or even another council, though I suspect that if there were organized recruiting efforts going on across council boundaries, there might be some intervention from the council level. "Recruiting" aside, I'm pretty sure there is no rule against having a member who lives in another district, or even another council. At least one boy in my son's troop lives in another council. He was not "recruited" in the usual sense; there was some problem with the troop he was in in his home town (I think it may have collapsed), he and his father (now one of our ASM's) were aware of our troop because he has relatives in the troop (our CC = his uncle and our former SPL = his cousin), so he decided to join us. They drive quite a distance to be in our troop but this is where he wants to be. But as I said, that instance of council-jumping did not result from any organized process. Link to post Share on other sites
NWScouter 9 Posted November 8, 2004 Share Posted November 8, 2004 Living near the county line that also is our council border we have troops that draw from both counties. We lose some Webelos to troops south of the border as well as have scouts from south of the border join our troops. My church sits 60 blocks north of the county border but the street in front of the church is the border between the school districts and our scout district. Then if you head 30 blocks east you are in another school district and scout district again. When I was scoutmaster the troop had scouts from 6 different school districts and home schooled, living in two councils and four different scout districts. One scout traveled 40 miles to come to our troop. In fact we have one troop in our council who meet in a school situated in our council but their charter partner is across the county line in the other council. We have an elementary school in our council that is about 100 yards from the county line and the pack that meets there is in the other council. My understanding is when the school was built 20+ years ago the students came from a school south of the line and they organized the pack in that council because they all were active in that council. Their school district is two councils. Then we have whole wards of the LDS that cover the area just south of my church whose boys all live in our council but the ward building is across the county line and therefore are in the other council. All this aside do not hesitate to recruit boys from across the line. The goal is not to win a turf war but to get youth into Scouting. Link to post Share on other sites
Bob White 20 Posted November 8, 2004 Share Posted November 8, 2004 It may often appear that council and district boundaries follow county lines but in fact they usually follow school district borders. Since school districts, for government funding purposes, and tax purposes, are usually encapsulated into a single county it makes the scout maps at first glance appear to be divided that way. Council borders are determined by the BSA regional offices and councils are restricted from dipping into nearby councils for money, manpower or membership. Districts are specific geographic subsets of a council for the pupose of easier local administration. They are determined by the council executive board and the SE absed on youth population and financial resources as well as other consideration. Unless you district has 100% of the available youth involved in scoutig within your own district, there is no reaon to be dipping into a neighboring district for theirs. If you know of an untapped pocket where scouting could be introduced outside of your own area of adminiutsration, the proper thing to do would be to contact the District professional for that community and direct them there. Link to post Share on other sites
EagleInKY 14 Posted November 8, 2004 Share Posted November 8, 2004 Around here, packs are typically aligned with schools. In some cases, there are more than one pack per school. In other cases, it's more than one school per pack. Troops tend to draw from a larger region. While there is close to a 1-to-1 ratio of packs to troops, you do see some boys crossing over into different units based upon interests, friends or location. We're located fairly near a district border. I do know that some of the packs and troops in our area draw from neighboring districts. I've also known of some boys from our area that have gone to units in neighboring districts. The reason usually is that the unit is either (a) at the boy's church, (b) at the boy's school or © where his older brother belongs/belonged. We have an interesting anomoly coming up next year. Our school district is going to get "mangled" for two years while some new schools are being built. About 1/2 of the boys that would normally go to our elementary school are going to end up a few miles down the road. Our plan is to go to that elementary school during that 2 year period and recruit the boys that would normally be in our school. We're not going there to recruit anyone but them. Otherwise, in two years, they'll be back at our school, but in a pack down the road. Link to post Share on other sites
NJCubScouter 1389 Posted November 8, 2004 Share Posted November 8, 2004 Bob says: It may often appear that council and district boundaries follow county lines but in fact they usually follow school district borders. Since school districts, for government funding purposes, and tax purposes, are usually encapsulated into a single county it makes the scout maps at first glance appear to be divided that way. I often forget that in many states, school districts are county-wide. It's easy to forget in New Jersey, where every municipality (some of which are very small) has its own school district, unless it has chosen to regionalize with other districts. Even with regionalization, we have something like 550 school districts, in 21 counties. In fact, regionalization can create even more districts, because there are a number of high-school-only districts, usually with one high school, while each municipality in the district still has its own district that operates the schools for K-8. We even have some districts that have no schools at all, and when the governor recently proposed abolishing these districts, there was an outcry. By amazing coincidence, our school property taxes are also among the highest in the nation, if not the highest. (That was sarcasm there, about the amazing coincidence.) So in NJ, school district boundaries don't help in setting district or council lines. The council lines do mostly follow county lines, though exceptions exist. The district lines don't seem to necessarily follow county lines at all, and I guess now that I have read Bob's post, I understand why. There is no need to follow county lines when the county might have 30 school districts within it. None of which helps Cajuncody, I guess. In fact we don't even know whether the schools in question in her post are in a different district, so maybe she doesn't have a problem. (I just realized that in another thread I may have called Cajuncody a "he," if so, sorry about that.) Link to post Share on other sites
cajuncody 10 Posted November 8, 2004 Author Share Posted November 8, 2004 NJCS: He/She? With internet annonimity it doesn't hurt my feelings, now if we were face to face I might be offended. All To be specific our pack is supposed to "Serve Kodak" which is a small community that straddles 3 countys. We are in an area where 3 counties come together in a point. The schools I am thinking of are located close to the county lines also. I know for a fact that one of them doesn't have scouts at all due to a failed pack. The other school doesn't appear to have a scout program. Since we have plenty of room (read "few boys") we could use some more boys. I am awaiting a call about districts now so I will let you know. Kristi Link to post Share on other sites
dan 10 Posted November 8, 2004 Share Posted November 8, 2004 Why not go to www.scouting.org use the council locater to see which council these scouts should be in? All you need is a Zip code. Or I am I missing something? Link to post Share on other sites
cajuncody 10 Posted November 9, 2004 Author Share Posted November 9, 2004 I am looking at district lines, not council lines. Kristi Link to post Share on other sites
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